Sunday, November 06, 2011

At least 20 people have been reported killed in the latest clashes inSyria as the government called on anyone with arms to turn themselveswithin one week to qualify for an amnesty.

As massive anti-government demonstrations took place across the countryfollowing Friday prayers, four civilians were reported to have been killedafter security forces opened fire on protesters in the district of Kanakerin the capital, Damascus.

Two protesters were reported killed in Hama, and one in the city ofHamouriya, not far from Damascus. Two others were reported killed tryingto cross the border and flee into Jordan, according to reports.

Six reported deaths in the Bab Amro area of Homs on Friday came a dayafter 22 civilians were reportedly killed there in a military crackdown.

"At least 10 people were injured, but ambulances were prevented fromentering the area to reach the wounded. And we are hearing reports thatplanes are still hovering over the district," El-Shamayleh said.

Specific information about the three other reported deaths was notimmediately available.

In the port city of Latakia, an activist said he counted 13 securitytrucks surrounding the main Arsalan mosque. He said at least threeprotesters were wounded by security forces firing in front of the Bazarmosque in the centre of the city.

"They were hit and taken by the security forces. In front of every mosquein Latakia there are several hundred security personnel carrying eitherbatons, handguns, or automatic rifles," the activist said.

Amnesty deal

Friday's violence came as Syria's government announced details of aweek-long amnesty period, starting from Saturday.

"The interior ministry calls on citizens who carried weapons, sold them,delivered them, transported them or funded buying them, and did not commitcrimes, to hand themselves into the nearest police station," statetelevision said on Friday.

"The interior ministry assures that those who turn themselves in ... willthen be freed immediately and it will be considered as a general amnesty,"the state media said.

The US State Department advised Syrians against turning themselves in.

The renewed violence appeared to contravene a mediation deal agreedbetween Damascus and the Arab League on Wednesday which had called forSyrian troops to end their presence in cities and residential areas.

The agreement, which also called for the release of all politicalprisoners and monitoring of the situation inside Syria by league officialsand foreign media, was announced at an emergency meeting in Cairo, wherethe regional body gathered to discuss plans to ease the violence and endthe unrest in Syria.

The peace deal "emphasised the need for the immediate, full and exactimplementation of the articles in the plan", but members of the SyrianNational Council (SNC), an umbrella opposition group, have voiced seriousscepticism over the government's willingness and sincerity to put the dealinto effect.

"There is no indication on the ground that the Syrian government has atall started implementing the Arab League proposal to end the unrest," AlJazeera's El-Shamayleh said.

BEIRUT — A Syrian peace plan brokered by the Arab League unraveled Fridayas security forces killed 15 people, opening fire on thousands ofprotesters who denounced President Bashar Assad and said he never intendedto hold up his end of the deal to end the violence.

The bloodshed, only two days after Syria agreed to the deal, suggestsDamascus is unwilling — or unable — to put a swift end to a crackdown thatalready has killed 3,000 people since the uprising began in March.

"This regime is not serious about ending its brutal crackdown," saidMustafa Osso, a Syria-based human rights lawyer. "Today was a real testfor the intentions of the regime and the answer is clear to everyone whowants to see."

The crisis in Syria has burned for nearly eight months despite widespreadcondemnation and international sanctions aimed at chipping away at theailing economy and isolating Assad and his tight circle of relatives andadvisers. The protesters have grown increasingly frustrated with thelimits of their peaceful movement, and there are signs of a growing armedrebellion in some areas.

Some protesters even are calling for the kind of foreign military actionthat helped topple Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

But NATO has ruled out any plans for Syria, a country of 22 million with acombustible mix of sectarian and religious identities, and Assad still hasa firm grip on power. The iron loyalty of his security apparatus sets thestage for an increasingly destructive fight over the future of a nationruled for more than four decades by the Assad dynasty.

Tremors from the unrest in Syria could shake the region. Damascus' web ofallegiances extends to Lebanon's powerful Hezbollah movement and Iran'sShiite theocracy. And although Syria sees Israel as the enemy, thecountries have held up a fragile truce for years.

Thousands of protesters braved cold and rainy weather Friday afteropposition groups called for a large turnout to test whether the regimewould in fact refrain from using deadly force, as agreed under the ArabLeague plan. But gunfire erupted shortly after the protests began,following the same pattern seen during previous Friday protests formonths.

"Arab League, beware of Bashar Assad!" read one banner carried byprotesters in the central city of Homs, which has turned into one of thecountry's most deadly areas due to the military crackdown and what appearsto be growing sectarian bloodshed.

Two main activist groups, the British-based Syrian Observatory for HumanRights and the Local Coordinating Committees, said at least 15 people werekilled Friday, most of them in Homs and suburbs of the Syrian capital.

The violence was a blow to the 22-nation Arab League, which announcedWednesday that Damascus had agreed to a broad peace plan that also calledfor the Syrian government to pull tanks and armored vehicles out ofcities, release political prisoners and allow journalists and rightsgroups into the country.

Officials from the Cairo-based Arab League could not be reached forcomment Friday, the start of a holiday weekend.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said theAssad regime has yet to live up to a single commitment it has made to theArab League. She said the government's "long, deep history of brokenpromises" appears to be continuing.

The Arab League plan presented flaws at the outset, in part because it didnot provide for any repercussions if the regime reneges on itscommitments. There also was no mention of any on-the-ground monitoring tosupervise the regime's actions.

The government has largely sealed off the country from foreign journalistsand prevented independent reporting, making it difficult to confirm eventson the ground. Key sources of information are amateur videos postedonline, witness accounts and details gathered by activist groups.

The structure of Syria's security forces also could prevent any immediateend to the violence.

Assad, and his father before him, stacked key military posts with membersof their minority Alawite sect, ensuring the loyalty of the armed forcesby melding their fate with that of the regime.

If the regime falls, the argument goes, the country's Sunni majority gainsthe upper hand and the Alawites lose their privileged status. Althoughthere have been army defections, they appear to be mostly Sunniconscripts, not high-level commanders. Adding to the violence are theshabiha, the mafia-style network of young Alawite men who act as enforcersfor the regime.

The Syrian deadlock, in many ways, is rooted in the country's sectariandivide.

The Alawites rose from economic obscurity after the 1970 coup led byBashar Assad's father, Hafez, gaining power and financial muscle inexchange for loyalty to the Assads. It is their support that the youngerAssad sees as the key to continued power.

Alawites claim they would be oppressed as Muslim heretics if the Sunniscome to power, and Sunnis claim they are unable to get the government jobsessential to reach the lower rungs of the middle class.

The now-privileged Alawites, along with other minority groups who feelprotected under the Assad regime, would see majority rule as a risk atbest, a nightmare at worst.

Syria blames the bloodshed on "armed gangs" and extremists acting out aforeign agenda to destabilize the regime. Assad has played on some of thecountries worst fears to rally support behind him, painting himself as thelone force who can ward off the kind of radicalism and sectarianism thathave bedeviled neighbors in Iraq and Lebanon.

On Friday, Syria's Interior Ministry gave one week for anyone who wasinvolved in carrying, selling, buying or distributing arms to turnthemselves in and benefit from a pardon.

Analysts say Assad's support is waning, and his backers are oftenmotivated by little more than fear.

In a report this week, the International Crisis Group said the support "isalmost entirely of a negative sort: fear of sectarian retribution,Islamism, foreign interference, social upheaval or, more simply, anxietyabout the unknown."

Security forces in Bahrain have used tear gas and armoured vehicles todrive back hundreds of protesters advancing toward a heavily guardedsquare that was once the centre of pro-reform demonstrations in the Gulfnation.

Witnesses said hundreds of demonstrators marched to Pearl Square inBahrain's capital Manama after a funeral procession on Friday morning forthe 78-year-old father of an opposition leader.

According to the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, Ali Hasan al-Dehi wasbeaten to death by riot police on Wednesday while returning to his home inthe village of Dehi. Opposition groups claim he died as a result of hisalleged treatment by police.

The United States, whose Fifth Fleet is based in Bahrain, called on allsides to exercise restraint. It urged the government to be fullytransparent in the investigation of what happened to al-Dehi.

"We, the US, would encourage full transparency as this case proceeds andwe obviously call on everybody to exercise restraint," Victoria Nuland, aUS state department spokeswoman, said in Washington.

"It is a fragile time in Bahrain as all sides wait for the Bahrainiindependent commission of inquiry report."

The head of the commission, which was set up to investigate allegations ofhuman rights violations in Bahrain during months of unrest, on Monday wasquoted as saying that he had found evidence of systematic torture.

But the Bahraini ministry of health denied the accusation, saying thatal-Dehi had died from a heart attack after he fell unconscious at hishome.

Al-Dehi was the father of Hussein al-Dehi, who is the deputy-head of themain Shia opposition group. Authorities said he died of natural causes.

After his funeral, hundreds of mainly Shia Bahrainis tried to make theirway toward the former Pearl Roundabout - the site where anti-governmentprotests first began.

With assistance from troops from other gulf countries, the governmentended the protests with a violent crackdown that reportedly killed dozens.

Video and images uploaded on social media websites on Friday appeared toshow police cars driving at protesters in several locations.

Nabeel Rajab, president of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, said thegovernment had blocked roads to try to prevent people from attending thefuneral ceremony.

Bahrain is hoping to conclude an arms deal with the United States but thepurchase could hinge on the results of the commission investigating thisyear's unrest and claims by Shias of abuse they suffered during martiallaw.

Break the Chains.info

is a news and discussion forum for supporters of political prisoners, prisoners of war, politicized social prisoners, and victims of police and state intimidation.

This blog is organized and updated autonomously of the disbanded Break the Chains Prisoner Support Network formerly based in Eugene, Oregon. While this online project shares several of the same concerns as the old Break the Chains collective, no formal organization exists behind the current web presence.

"I will never surrender my pride and dignity nor allow the system to 'cut my tongue' and I will always, without fear, speak out against these war crimes and crimes against humanity, no matter if I spend the rest of my life in a prison cage, and draw my last breath of air laying down in this steel bed surrounded by razor-wire fences and cages, and its prison policies that are designed to destroy one's humanity…."